


points of devotion

by fealle



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Crossover, Emotional Roller Coaster, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-02
Updated: 2013-11-02
Packaged: 2017-12-31 05:36:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1027871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fealle/pseuds/fealle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It happens once, twice, five hundred times again. (Reincarnation fic.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	points of devotion

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Точки нашего пересечения](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10052420) by [perfection_8](https://archiveofourown.org/users/perfection_8/pseuds/perfection_8)



> fill for this eruri reincarnation prompt: [It could be waiting at the bus stop, at the train station, passing each other in the street...I just want the moment where Erwin and Levi see each other in modern times and remember everything that happened in their past life, aka the SNK universe, including their relationship as lovers/reactions to each others' death.](http://snkkink.dreamwidth.org/3666.html?thread=5057618#cmt5057618)
> 
> spoilers for ch. 49 and up. the author will not even try to pretend to understand timey wimey bullshit, and hopes that the readers will just go along with it.

 

 

_get away from me_  
 _get away from me_  
 _before anybody has to bleed_

**08:45**

It started with -- a brush of hands in the rainy weather, completely accidental; but something like thunder rushes to Levi's mind, renders him weak and utterly weighed down by something greater than he is, sends him kneeling on the wet cobblestones, his newly-pressed khakis muddy on the knees.

Levi's 22. He's a burgeoning chef in a four-star hotel, on his way to his restaurant, late. The man who'd crashed into him rushed back and attempted to help him get back on his feet. "I'm so sorry -- do you need any help? are you alright?"

In Levi's tongue there's the lingering taste of metal and -- a certain dryness of mouth, which Levi knows isn't out of fear or awkwardness or anything, but because of being suspended too high in the air.

Ridiculous. Why should he know anything about flying?

Levi glares at the man -- blond, blue-eyed, tall and kneeling before him. "Shut up -- fuck off," he says, regaining the bite in his tone as soon as he's got his wits around himself; if the man was shocked, well, he'd done a good job of not showing him. "I'm late. What the hell are you gonna do about that, huh? inconsiderate fuck."

Blondie sighs. "I'm sorry. if you'd let me -- I can offer you a ride. I have a car."

Levi's about to refuse, but he's running late, so he tells him, "Better drive fast."

The man smiles at him, and from the way he does it -- awkwardly, rather than the natural way it comes to other people, Levi can tell he hasn't had much time to practice, let alone use it. "Of course. My name's Erwin, by the way. Erwin -- "

_Smith._

Levi's head was reeling. He hadn't realized he'd said it aloud until he saw Erwin looking at him oddly, cautiously; Levi noticed that his other hand, the one tucked halfway in his pocket, was suddenly curled, as if reaching for -- something, and then he slips it into his pocket.

"Erwin Smith, yes." there's an awkward pause as he says, "I suppose you've heard of me."

"I haven't," Levi replies tersely. "And if you're going to keep me in the rain, I'm going to make sure the only thing you remember about me is the fact that I bashed your head in for making me wait."

 

**09:20**

_Erwin Smith._ Later, while he was shivering and wet and disgusting in Erwin's company car, Levi finds out a lot of things about him via google: firstly, that there are a billion Smiths around the world; second, that the particular Erwin Smith who held his hand was apparently a famous banker/CEO, saviour of the current economic crisis they were battling for about a year.

His face, on the monitor, was rather unremarkable to him. He could pass that face any day, any time, on the streets, and not recognize him. But somehow, today was just -- different.

There's a song playing in the radio that he doesn't recognize: _oh, if I could go back in time / when you only held me in my mind ...._

"I didn't catch your name."

"That's because I didn't give it." Levi pockets his phone, annoyed. "Levi."

There's that smile again. "No last names?"

"I don't trust strangers who offer the back of their cars to me."

"You accepted," Erwin tells him. His face still has that cautious look into it, but Levi can tell, from this distance, that the easy banter they've fallen to was somewhat more .... Natural.

"Displays of wealth tend to make me weak in the knees, what can I say?" And the bastard has the gall to laugh at him, as if they've done this once, ten thousand, hundreds of times.

Levi doesn't answer. He gives him a withering glare and looks out the window, the rain still pounding the windows and the rest of the world, covering the streets in a light grey mist. They're driving rather fast, as per Levi's request, and while his clothes were dirty, he'd refused Erwin's offers to buy him other clothes, simply because he wasn't comfortable running a tab with the man too easily as he'd just guessed (guessed?) his name or accepted his offer to follow him, lead him where he needs to be. The latter was more worrying. Why did he follow? why did he say yes? Why ....

He hadn't realized that all this time, Erwin was staring at him, and Levi, annoyed, asks him, "What?"

Erwin hesitates for a bit before replying, "I'm sorry. it was .... " he frowns, as if this inadequacy of information was new to him, and Levi bets that it is, for a man who, apparently, according to google, has planned his success with ruthless grace .... "You reminded me of someone else."

"How fucking romantic."

"Forgive me. I'm usually a lot more eloquent -- "

Everything else happens in a blink of an eye. The car suddenly stops, crashes, and Levi, horrified, witnesses the car ripped apart in half and the force of the impact tear Erwin's arm from out of his body, Erwin too stunned to even realize what had happened, and then --

 

**08:45**

It started with --

A brush of hands in a room, during the rainy weather, completely accidental, except that Levi could swear that he's felt this hand once, twice, ten thousand times in five years (five years?) when the man reaches to hold his hand, and tells him, "You need not be so frightened, your highness."

 _King_ Leviathan has a nicer ring to it compared to _crown prince_ Leviathan, and god, what a long fight it has been for Levi to get here. He's about to be fitted for his coronation, and the velvet tickles his skin in a way that irritates him. Erwin, his aide, fits the garters of his stockings over his thighs. "You will be magnificent."

"I already am," Levi points out.

Erwin raises an eyebrow. "Well, your grace, there's always room for a mind to improve itself, even for kings. One day they will call you the most powerful warrior of -- "

 _Mankind_ , Erwin wants to say, but somehow they felt wrong, the way Levi scoffs at him and tells him, "Yes, well, my family did raise me to be a titan -- " to which Levi pales after having uttered it, as well, because when he said _titan_ he meant in a way that encompassed abstract things like _power_ and _glory_ , not accompanied with the smell of burning flesh and the taste of blood in his mouth.

He suddenly felt ill. Perhaps Erwin noticed it too, as well, because in a moment his hands were around his waist and he tells him, "We could schedule this at a later time."

Levi shakes his head. "No. We -- no. This is my duty. We must proceed."

There's a slight smile in Erwin's face when he asks him, "Is that an order, your highness?"

And Levi, confused, feeling a pang of ache in his chest that constricts him suddenly, tells him, "Yes." he doesn't know why, but he's afraid.

 

**09:20**

That the king was having an affair was not wholly unnatural; it wasn't the first time there was a royal cocksucker in the family, anyway, and unfortunately for them Levi was strong enough, and cunning enough, to take on any other accusations against his manhood and otherwise when it comes to scandals and politics and the like. Erwin had been with him ever since he was a boy; historians like to say that Erwin followed him in his youth when he'd seen what vigor, what fire the prince had in him following the death of his parents and his close friends, but that's not exactly true; it was Levi who begged him to stay with him, Levi who told him in a fit of madness that he'd kill him himself before the Bertholdts and the Leonhardts ever enter their lands and put Erwin's head on a pike, much as they'd done to the others, and it was Erwin, partly out of mercy and partly out of foresight, who said yes to him the first time; Erwin his tutor, friend, and mentor, and sometimes lover.

Fast forward two bloody rebellions in half a decade and Levi was made king. In his coronation he had settled matters of land, wife, and riches with a tentative truce with the Bertholdts and leonhardts, and with his own volatile citizens, filled with the crippled and the traumatized and the young, remnants of his war, remnants of his father's war, and his great-grandfather's war. He remembers seeing Annie's cold eyes following him like daggers, Bertholdt's solid, immobile form watching him as he signs the documents with his awful shorthand, Erwin watching everyone like the rest of them were conducting business by talking to each other's reflections in a room full of mirrors.

A crown is a heavy and bloody thing to wear that fits around the king's unfortunate head, Levi's parents once said, and he can't remember if that was something told to him in a moment of clarity and true sanity or something they'd said in a drunken fit. The green and white robes of his house feel suffocating, but he has no choice, someone else has to take the mantle, to dip their hands in blood though he would do anything else but. He was, at least, not alone. Erwin's presence in his life was a consolation as much as it was an annoyance, and if anything else, he was looking forward to seeing him in his room after the proceedings.

He walks the aisle to the throne with a practiced air, and he was about to take his seat on the crown when something erupts in the room --

The walls fall --

and there was much chaos as the soldiers run to protect him, and Levi draws his sword, telling them to come find him, come find him and his sword and meet their ends --

five or six assassins of unnatural height, tall and sinewy with red and green robes bearing down at him with smiles that seem to split their faces in half, run to him and easily overpower his knights, his kingsguard. Levi kills three of them; and the other two --

move against Erwin and tear him from limb to limb and there was a roar that was ripped out of his throat in such a fury that he's never known himself before --

 

 

_oh I wish I've never, ever seen your face_

**08:45**

Levi wakes up to the sound of rain slowly falling. it's still dark, even if it's already morning; there's a coldness in the air that makes it feel more comfortable to sink underneath the blankets and just forgo the rest of the day.

He glances at the man beside him. Erwin -- he thinks that's a real name, which is odd, most people don't want to give out their names -- is still asleep, his chest slowly rising and falling as he breathes. Levi traces the ridge and dip of muscle with a finger slightly hovering over his torso, lingering over Erwin's scars. He wonders where he'd get them from; a man as well-built and vain as this guy surely isn't doing any sort of risky work that'd involve earning these scars, but what does Levi know? Maybe employment's different now for rich kids, they whore themselves out for even richer assholes who're bored of their money and wealth and need some direction to point their lives to, and maybe that involves mounting someone's asshole to feel better, and Levi snickers to himself.

Eventually, Erwin stirs, and he takes Levi's hand into his own. "I would've thought you'd be gone by morning."

"You told me, last night, to stay by you until you're awake." Levi yawns. "Now that you're awake, I can probably find my clothes again and leave."

It's bad for business, the way he grants favours from the man like he's a lover, not a customer, but Levi's allowed to have some indulgences of his own. Erwin deals with cold hard cash as well as other additional vices he can supply, and while it's in bad form to date your supplier, technically it's even worse not to partake of whatever power Erwin wields. Sharing a bed and getting paid isn't anything compared to the advantage he'd get, and if that means being traded around like a coin by Erwin's hand, well, Levi knows a thing or two about being in the rough.

Erwin hasn't opened his eyes yet, but he can feel Levi rising, sitting up, stretching his limbs carefully. "I ask you to stay, and just like that, you say 'yes'. Is that where we at, right now?"

Levi glances at him. "More or less. Better up your pay, I'm about to double your charge."

"Would've thought you'd give me a discount .... "

Levi scoffs at him, picks up his pillow and whacks him on the face. "Prostitutes get paid for their work, asshole."

The problem is that Levi can't find his clothes because Erwin's apartment is too large, and while it's fairly clean, there's a problem of them being too horny last night and just randomly fucking everywhere and now Levi has to find his clothes wedged in the couch, for example, or his shoes in the dining room and the other one in the shower. In the end, he manages to find them all, and he wears them with a certain resignation.

Erwin comes out of his room later on, in his boxers, perfect hair messed up this time, and Levi smiles a bit, despite himself. "Do you want anythng before you leave? I can pay you double now, since you did say something about raising your prize."

"We can start next time," he tells him. Erwin nods.

"In that case, please do me a favour."

Levi narrows his eyes as Erwin takes a sheet from his note pad beside his phone and writes a name, handing it to him. There's nothing warm about him now, and despite being half-naked, Levi knows this man wasn't the same asshole that took him to bed the night before, and the many nights before that.

"You know what to do."

 

**09:20**

One would think that maintaining an empire with your own private army was good enough to secure its safety, even for a second, but that's not what happens; Levi became aware of how dire things were when, after being split in different directions with men circling them ( _Bertholdts, Ymirs, Jaegers, Leonhardts,_ oh, Levi knows their names, he knows them well because once upon a time he breathed the same air as they did, fought and were injured and shrugged all scars right after, but like every fairy tale all children must grow up, and that's his job, to see that they all do, starting with him and Erwin, god, they fought so hard to keep the children from escaping the city but there's only so much you can do to cage them) that Levi realized: they were not stopping. No matter how many he cut in half with his sword, more and more kept returning, and Levi was momentarily afraid -- who sold them? who gave their names out? Pixis wouldn't, he's an old man and he's sympathetic to the city Erwin was building, even if it was built on broken glass, but Nile, yes, he was a coward, Nile might, he never did respect them and neither did they, there's no love lost there --

Hange comes to aid him, her eyes hard as steel behind those glasses. "Levi, we're completely surrounded -- I can't contact Erwin." Her voice is short and terse and betrays only the slightest emotion as she tells him, and Levi wraps his hands around the hilt of his sword tighter.

"Give me five. I'll hunt Mike down and figure things out on the south end and then hunt for Erwin. You gonna be fine?"

Hange laughs. "It's just a damn tuesday, Levi. Leave the west to me!"

He might've smiled, which means it's the second time that day that he did, god, isn't he just full of surprises today, that almost never happens. Half an hour later covered in blood from head to toe Levi makes a phone call from a payphone across the gas station, wired, slightly exhausted but not ready to lay down his swords yet. Fighting was a profession as much as it was a way of life, and while some people like to fight for things such as _humanity_ or

(the phone rings, once, twice, disconnects; Levi frowns and inserts more coins, makes the call again)

shit like _freedom_ and those are such abstract concepts but they're also a reality down Below. That Erwin was, at least, willing to make things a little better down Below was something else, but it involves overturning an entire heirarchy which nobody was preferred for, so now they have to deal with split factions, mostly children not knowing what they want; but these children grow into half-murderous adults with no sense of community other than with their fellow inmates in this cage. Levi gets it, Below was suffocating, but he knew -- and he was convinced he was right -- that there was no way they'd find the same mercy Above, because

(the phone rings, once, twice, disconnects; Levi snarls and makes the call again, his fist slamming on the side of the phone booth)

those Above were the ones intent on keeping them Below. With every happiness bought Above was more suffering inflicted Below, and that's why the first method of reconstruction was to rid Below of those who want to go Above without knowing a single thing about how they're going to leave an empty underground, empty of children and dreams and ideals, things that Below was scarce of but they never were truly wiped out, can't, so long as people survived there; you can't make a revolution just from bombs, you have to build their minds to, but of course that wasn't enough,

(the phone rings. Levi shouts Erwin's name, but never makes it to the last syllable as he hears, on the other line, glass breaking, guns firing, and then a tense silence.

"- hello? hello? goddamit, Erwin -- "

".... I have a replacement. You know what to do, Levi." That was all he said, until he hears the _click_ of the phone being hung up on the other side of the line. Levi didn't know how long he stood there. He walked out in the street in a haze not knowing where _forward_ was.)

that was never enough --

 

**08:45**

It starts with the rain, again, and Levi standing in the middle of the street not knowing, for a second, who he was and where he is, what manner of time and place he was in and how he got there. It seemed like for the longest time everything was just noise to his ears: the sound of horses moving through cobblestones, people moving from stall to stall in the market, men and women chattering, children playing and splashing themselves in the rain. All of it was white noise to him, as if the world was an endless sunday narrated in a soft-spoken radio from a far off land, speaking a language he barely understands but knows, _once upon a time_ , that it had mattered to him.

It takes him a while to realize someone is talking to him.

"Hey, mister, would you like to buy some flowers? Hey! You okay?"

Levi blinks, once, twice, before realizing that he has to open his mouth but then he looks at the girl and freezes.

(blonde hair brown eyes _ten solo kills fourty-eight assist kills_ )

"Sorry," he tells her, and then he runs.

 

**09:20**

Everywhere he walked he could see ghosts that he barely remembered, could touch them in his hands, and Levi wonders if this is what means to finally go mad. He knows these people were supposed to be dead, how, he doesn't know, but they've come to the land of the living looking for him, moving past him, catching his eye in the crowd: "Hey -- I know this is really weird, but, have we met before?" ( _thirty-two team kills 14 solo_ )

"Pretty sure we haven't." Levi was shivering. He needs to find -- a hotel, a house, or something, but where does he live? Where did he come from ( _Below_ )? And more importantly, how does he leave? ( _fly_ )

"Alright. Sorry, I guess ... Wow, I guess that was really forward, huh. Anyway, you gonna be okay? you don't look too good, sorry to say this."

"I'm fine," Levi grits out. "I need to rest, I just got caught up in a cold and you're not fucking helping."

"... Right, sorry. If you don't mind? I've got a friend who runs a diner at the end of this block. If you, uh, tell me I sent you, he'll give you a discount on the food and everything."

Levi doesn't have anywhere else to go but forward, so he goes. The man calls out: "Good luck, and -- thanks."

He glances back at him. "For what?"

"I don't know," the man says helplessly, and Levi thinks, it's no use trying to get it out of him, for some reason he just doesn't know why he's doing the things he's doing either. "Look, this is really gonna sound weird, but -- I was walking to work today, and then all of a sudden I can't remember anything about that. You ever get those days?"

"No," Levi lies. "But you probably wanna have that checked."

The man laughs. "I guess. Thanks for -- I don't know. Trusting me, I guess."

"I didn't say anything about going -- "

"I know, just. I need to say it. I'm sorry, I made this even more awkward. I'm leaving now. Thanks again."

 

\--

 

The diner was small, but clean and well-lit, and Levi feels awkward walking in with his muddy shoes and wet clothes and everything. _57th_ was the name. Levi is not a superstitious man; he tries to tell himself that he has nothing to run away from, but what choice does a man have when everything keeps coming back to him in small doses, bitter medicine for a sickness that never passed, which he never asked to have? He doesn't remember what he's responsible for, but the way he kept thinking about death at the time, you'd think he willingly sent men and women to their deaths because -- because?

How did he get to thinking about such things? He seats himself in a booth, wrapping his coat tighter around him as he stares outside the window. The waiter in the place was someone talking rather sullenly to his supervisor, whom Levi doesn't see because he's standing behind a door ( _thirty-nine solo kills and nine team kills_ , not bad, but Levi knows for some reason that he's got more than that -- how? How? How?).

There's coffee placed on his table, plus cutlery (spoon fork _knife_ ) and a plate. The guy who serves him isn't sullen guy but rather, a tall blonde one, blue eyes, unsmiling face grave. Levi takes the knife, his index finger running on the edge of the blade and threatening to cut his skin.

"You told me, once upon a time, that you were going to kill me."

Levi reaches for his coffee and was going to drink it by holding on to the handle, until he realizes, no, that's wrong, and then takes it from the rim instead. "I think I'm late, too. How long it's been? five? six?"

The man doesn't say anything, which was all well and good, because Levi _did_ make such a promise a long time ago, and though he's not a superstitious man, he likes to think of himself as a man of his word, and anyway, he can't lose anything if he said _no_ instead of _yes_ \--

\- nobody saw it coming except for Levi when he rose and slit his throat over his table, and everything else was white noise --

(except for him and a boy down Below who remembered looking into those eyes and telling him, _I am going to kill you_ , and that boy was nowhere to be found, not anymore.)

 

 

_everything I crave I become  
everything I left I've forgotten  
everything I love I become_

**08:45**

It happens once, twice, five hundred times again.

 

**09:20**

And little by little he remembers.

 

 

_you sit there in your heartache  
waiting on someone to save you from your old ways_

**08:45**

Everything seems to happen to Levi in rain and in the first light of dawn.

He wakes up with a jolt, with a faint remembrance of lives unlived, remembered, forgotten; things that slipped briefly in between the spaces of his fingers just when he thought he'd grasped the situation in his hands, just when he thought he'd had control.

(It never occurs to him: perhaps he was not meant to be.)

 

\--

 

He's late for school.

This is also new, because he's never had any sort of education like most people from Above had, but this is not Above or Below, this is somewhere else. If there's anything that Levi regrets it's the fact that there was, quite literally, a myriad of universes unknown where he could've been happy, or not hungry, or free, and none of them will ever be enough to fill in the one he's lost.

He's late for school. He doesn't know his name; not that it matters when he knows he'll lose it again in an hour or so. Mike stops by outside of his house and asks, "Do you need a ride?"

"No. Not today." He walks briskly to the bus stop, but it's not the regular bus that he's taking. Mike frowns. "Everything alright?"

"No," Levi says. He's tense as hell and he's biting the knuckles of his left hand in some gesture of nervousness that he'd inherited in this world, because he knows he never does that. Levi thinks, _what does it matter, I'm probably doing myself a favour in this goddamned place._

"I guess you're not going to school today?"

"No." And then, just to keep up a semblance of normality: "Cover up for me."

Mike, somewhat dubious but nevertheless trusting him, nods.

 

\--

 

He rings the doorbell for #57, Willow drive.

A tall man with blond hair opens his door, and his eyes widen when he sees him. "You -- "

"Hurry up and let me in, we haven't got much time," he snarls. And then -- "Actually, fuck that, let me tell you something."

He kisses him.

 

**09:00**

Erwin serves the tea in steaming mugs; Levi doesn't take his own and waits for Erwin to take a sip of his tea while he watches the clock. In his quiet apartment, everything seems so loud, and the ticking of the clock

( _I have wounds,_ Levi realizes, slowly, when breathing becomes a bit more difficult and all of a sudden his ankle aches. _I've been injured. There was a_ )

is killing him second by second. Erwin's hand shook as he sets his mug back on the table. "I remember you in your third year, but quite honestly, Mr. -- "

"Levi. Call me Levi, goddamnit. It's my name," his knuckles are white as he holds on to the edge of the table, angry, desperate. "I have a right to be called by my damn name."

Erwin presses his lips into a thin line. "... Levi. Alright, then. Honestly, what has gotten into you? You know you're a student -- "

"I'm not. For fuck's sake, Erwin, you know I'm not." He could barely keep the edge of a plea away from his voice. " _You_ know. No -- shut your goddamn mouth, let me talk, I don't have time. I'm not alone in here. I know -- something -- in your life -- changed. I don't know what it is, but you're not what you are, aren't you? Like, there's Erwin Smith, teacher who pervs on his students, whatever, I'm not judging you. And then there's _Erwin Smith_ , there's an image of him in your mind that you know dictates your every will, because that's what he is -- "

The sound of a bone fracturing interrupts his rant. Erwin looks at him in fear and worry. "Levi, you're injured -- "

( _female titan. First one we've ever seen with such intelligence. Never thought I'd have problems, but you know, after five years you're bound to get bored and reckless when something like her comes. I never did find out_ )

" _Erwin dictates_ , that's what he does, everyone obeys. And I've always been at your side. Tell me you haven't dreamt of leaving this place all your life." There's something wild and manic in him right now; Levi notes that his wrists were getting more painful to move, so he stops holding on to the edge of the table and tries to relax his body on the seat, to no avail. This body was not meant to withstand the injuries that he'd inflicted on it for five years. "Tell me you're fucking sick of this place, tell me you hate how safe everything is, sitting behind a desk and hoping that the future gets much brighter for the rest of your kids while the rest of the world seems to be hell-bent on tripping over the cliff. Tell me you haven't had dreams of death and dying and five years of hell and politics. _Tell me_ , at the very least, that you remember who I am, or who Hange is, or Mike, or Nanaba, or the rest of us left in that godforsaken place beyond the walls -- "

"Levi, stop -- "

"- don't fucking _tell me_ to stop when everything's at stake here!" he takes his mug and throws it at him, steaming tea and all, and Erwin, automatically, dodges out of the way and against the window on the side in practiced movements, as if he were trained, all his life, to react to such swift violence.

The mug shatters against the wall, tea dripping slowly onto the linoleum floors.

"I .... I didn't know I could do that," Erwin says, his voice slow, as if waking up from a dream.

(09:15)

He looks at Levi, thoughtful, confused.

"I've had dreams. I dreamt of a wall .... of a giant man stripped of his skin. No -- flayed of his skin, burning, or -- nothing but muscle. With .... a huge mouth, and huge eyes. I remember

( _what happened to Erwin. All I know_ )

dreaming about flying. But I never thought -- " Erwin shakes his head. "They were all just dreams, weren't they? It's not practical to dwell on dreams. I've a job, I've a family to take care of."

"Family," Levi sneers. "Tell me the names of your wife and your children, Erwin. If you remember."

God, the look on his face when Erwin realizes he couldn't remember who they were. Levi bites his lower lip, and watches the clock. (09:18) He just needs a way to pull this off. He's not a superstitious or religious man but surely a man can only suffer through so many lifetimes before he becomes desperate enough to find other ways of destroying himself.

When he speaks again, he's lot kinder, his voice a lot less ruthless. "Come with me," he tells him softly. "There's no way out of this other than -- "

09:20.

The window shatters.

A bullet pierces neatly through the back of his neck and out of his throat, and Erwin drops to the floor.

( _was that Erwin left, and of course, I was waiting for him to come back with the rest of our friends._ )

 

**08:45**

Levi wakes up. Outside, there was a storm.

For once, just once, he stays in bed until time moves, _tick, tock_ , to twenty past nine.

 

**09:20**

The radio alarm starts with breaking news:

_"Commander Erwin Smith falls in the battle of -- today, a decisive military blow to the country of -- . Citizens are urged to apply for refugee status as soon as possible through -- offices stationed in the following provinces ..... Please exercise the greatest of caution and always remember to bring the necessary documents to make processing easier for you and our workers -- Commander Erwin Smith is the greatest military strategist and field commander of this century, born and raised in -- trained under -- great man -- but seems like not even the greatest of our own men could break the stride of our enemies, who continue pressing against the borders of -- good people, I would like to wish you all well, but optimism is so hard to find nowadays -- Commander Erwin Smith -- "_

 

 

_just a longing  
born without a trace_

 

 

(Levi was burning.

It wasn't the regular turmoil of a fevered body, if it were the case that he was sick and feverish. No; his body burned, heat seared every inch and fold of his skin even in the rain.

In his dreams he was dying. In his dreams he dreamt a conversation, long ago, where Levi swore his heart and blood to a king behind the king.

He wakes up with the taste of ashes in his mouth.)

 

**08:45**

Sina, five thousand years after the arrival of the colossal titan:

Erwin Smith sits on a stall for cheap noodles, reading the news on his hand-held device painful in its pink glow against the screen: `SEVEN REPLICANTS ESCAPED FROM COLONIES. HIGHLY ARMED AND DANGEROUS.` Below the caption, seven pictures in day-glo blue revealed Replicants of the 57th line. Their names, of course, were quite common nowadays: Petra, Mike, Bossard. His fingers linger over a photograph of Levi. The Replicant's model was a janitorial Replicant, but he'd been a Nexus 6. `MUTINY`, the online tabloids screamed. `OFF-WORLD COLONIES THREATENING THE SECURITY OF SINA. TYRELL TO APPEAL.`

He switches tabs. He could feel a headache coming. Mr. Choi gives him his regular noodles, and Erwin smiles him his thanks, though he feels a bit restless tonight.

He's retired. He shouldn't be bothering with issues about Tyrell ever since they've replaced him with Jaeger. Jaeger's a good kid, younger, much more enthusiastic than he'd been a couple of years ago when he first entered the force, but Jaeger himself -- rumors abound, and of course Erwin pays attention to all of them, especially the curious ones -- had been known to fail the Voight-Kampff before he'd actually managed to get a score that was human enough to be considered as a candidate. The Voight-Kampff is, of course, said to be infallible, considering the trust it's built based on mega-million branding and marketing strategies, but occasionally, it's bound to disappoint a mother or two.

Erwin's retired. But then Hange came. Hange, with her perpetual little origami monsters of things she couldn't remember filling up her gray office as she explains, "One arm or none, the brass want you back, Commander." She sighs as she folds another one of those animals -- four-legged things with a horn -- among her paper menagerie of beasts. Erwin notes that the more stressed Hange becomes the more humanoid the shapes become, which had always been a reason to draft her in for another V-K testing because of the mental circumstances her hobby has developed in. But Hange always scores a good empathic score in the V-K ( _it's all in the details_ , she tells him airily), which is why nobody questions her much. There's a line between obsessions and artistry, Erwin supposed; though he's not sure exactly where those lumpy humanoid clumps of folded paper were supposed to fit in, because he knows that Hange, on more than one occasion, has referred to them as 'titans', which she draws out of the expanse of her mind.

Erwin felt the stump of his arm ache again, and he must've flinched visibly when a sharp sensation of pain shot through him, because Hange looked even more worried. "Are you alright -- ?"

Erwin shakes his head. "It's the damn rain," he tries to tell her as cheerfully as he could, in case someone else is listening. You never know nowadays, and his presence here is enough to set off alarm bells. He'd put down half of the insurrections down with him and his crew, and more than half of the Replicants in Tyrell's scrapyard died at his hands. "Tends to make things a bit painful. I'm old, Hange. You know that."

Hange nods. "Yet nobody else comes close to your records when it comes to chasing Replicants." Her voice is a bit kinder when she says, "We need you again, Commander. There are people out there who are putting the pressure from the top down, and Tyrell is an old man. He's not too happy about the Nexus 6s going on revolt, even though -- "

Erwin gives her a look, because any more words and she'd be dragged in to another hearing, and Hange sighs, throws her hands in the air. "I know you're bored out of your skull, Erwin, and I also know you're broke. Two weeks. Hell, we only need the ringleader. And then we'll pay off your rent."

"You didn't call me here for a choice, then," Erwin says. Perhaps he should be more offended, but this is Hange. Perhaps that's why he can't be bothered to be more offended.

Hange smiles at him. "I've got a society to run, old man."

 

**08:50**

_Levi_ was short for _Leviathan_ , which was a very odd name to give to a Nexus 6 whose job description states "Janitorial", but then again, when it comes to the act of cleaning vermin and cleaning up humanity, the principles are always the same.

Erwin is not a man of regrets, because he can't afford to have too many. His fingers hover over the picture of the Nexus 6, a face that was not given to smiling or laughing -- it's not human, after all -- and was startled to realize that he doesn't believe himself when he thinks of him like that.

He goes home pondering this dilemma, and he ponders it for a few days trying to track down the elusive Replicant.

At 50, Erwin is certainly too old for a Blade Runner to be brought out of retirement. There was probably some hesitation involving on Hange's part, or the brass' part in casting him in this job again: for one thing, he had never recovered from the amnesia after his accident which cost his arm, and for another, Erwin just wasn't seen as a stable Blade Runner anymore. The reputation of Blade Runners have taken a hit ever since Deckard, a man whom Erwin feels a great sense of pity for. One should always be able to choose who to love; it's unnatural that one has to die for it, or be condemned for it.

The Nexus 6s were getting better and hardier at off-world defense and exploration, which meant that it was getting a lot harder to kill them. The safety measure of the 4-year rule is their only hope, for the most part; especially since more and more, the Replicants seem to be becoming more and more aware of their mortality. Erwin remembered speaking to a Replicant called Mikasa and asking her if she knew the circumstances of her birth was just as intercHangeable about the circumstances of the manufacturing of his gun; Mikasa, with such startling clarity, replies to him that obsolescence is the only inevitability that all things in this world unwillingly subscribe to.

Mikasa was with Eren, he remembers. Mikasa was a Nexus 5, but she will not live that long despite the 4-year mark due to the damages he'd inflicted on her at the height of his career. That was when Eren was still a cadet, nowhere near the ranking of a Blade Runner. He'd spared her for him, because she'd helped him get to where he is now, which is certainly what Sina needs. Although Erwin is fairly sure that the reason why he is retracing steps in his life dancing around his injury, Hange's growing obsession with her paper monsters, and his shortened career, is that Jaeger might've had something to do with it, out of revenge. Possibly with the help of Armin.

It's been a while since he was disposed to a hunt, and he feels so out of place in it. Not even a hunter, or a hunted. Just the sky in which all things pass before him.

He receives mail from Hange, noting that they've located Levi. Erwin puts on his best clothes, despite the rain, and makes the trip.

 

**09:00**

He finds the Replicant Levi at the edge of the ruined wall, high above lower Sina. The Replicant had short hair, white shirt, khaki pants. This was standard civilian clothing, but with his stature, Erwin thinks that he'd easily pass off as a child all the same if he needed to.

At the edge of the ruined wall, the rain doesn't fall as hard as it does in the city, but the wind picks up a bit. Erwin's stump was aching as his other sleeve flaps uselessly in the wind. He winces a bit as he takes step by step towards the Replicant. "Levi?"

Levi was sitting on the top of the wall, his feet dangling precariously over the wall. Erwin stands a few feet from him. Beyond them, the world was an endless gray and blue of existence and rain falling, obscuring memories, geography, or words. "I'm sorry," he begins. "But I've come to take you back." Back, like the two of them were just momentarily on vacation, and now Levi has to return. He holds the umbrella over his head and Levi's.

Levi doesn't say anything for a moment, which wasn't disconcerting but more of a relief, really, that the Replicant doesn't mind indulging in the silence and the serenity of the day with him. After a while, he says, "You told me to stay back."

Erwin looks at him in confusion. Underneath the shade of his umbrella, looking down on him, he notices steam rising from his skin as flecks of the flesh-colored paint slowly peels off of his shoulder, in small curls. Always death comes in slowest increments as the body burns bright before the endless dark. "I don't understand."

"Not right now, you don't," he tells him, just as easily. "But once upon a time, you told me to stay back. You went into the woods. I wanted to go with you -- or in your place, instead. I want to kill things. But I was also -- afraid," he tells him. He says it with the realization that this was only the first time he'd articulated the nature of the thing, even if Erwin didn't understand it. Levi looks at Erwin. "Can you believe that, that I was afraid?"

"Lots of men feel fear in their lives."

"I'm not human," Levi tells him. "Not here, anyway."

Erwin considers this, figures that it was much easier to get him to keep talking if he'd answered the former than the latter since the latter has no additional evidence to back it up, so he tells him, "You are made with the figure of the human in mind. Of course it's only natural that you might learn a bit of us, and sometimes, that includes things unnecessary to your kind, like fear."

Levi grips the concrete with his hands; there's a slight stress around his fingers that impressed the form of his hands on the concrete ledge. "I was afraid. And so, I asked you -- not to go."

Because he was being asked to participate in his dialogue, Erwin tilts his head to the side, considering his response, and then he says, "Do you regret it?"

"Maybe," Levi says. "I've spent lifetimes watching you die for that stupidity and I don't even know why."

"I can't say I understand how that works, either, but that seems to be the predicament at hand ..... it's an unfortunate punishment to be inflicted to someone, especially one whom you have a particularly vested interest on. Was I supposed to be in the forest instead?"

"You lose your arm and eventually, your status, if you go."

Erwin smiles with a faint hint of bitterness, and he could almost imagine the story in his mind. "I didn't take Replicants to be a sentimental breed."

"Hearts are a structural weakness, Commander." And then, quietly, that Erwin didn't catch the rest of the words: "especially fragile as offerings."

"So they are," he murmurs. "You are very thoughtful. You know what to do, then?"

Levi looks at him. Erwin smiles. When he speaks again there is a sense of fatigue, a sense of hatred for the corrupted world that he moved -- moves -- in, and a grief unmourned of lives lost and unlived greater than that hatred:

"Levi, when, in some other incarnation you've come to haunt me again, dispose of my arm at point A, ascend over my rank and status at point B, become my lover and my sword at point C, so that you can kill me with great bitterness at point D, witness my death again at point E, after you've confessed, if only so that I can haunt you in return at point F, so that we can finally meet again here, above lower Sina, where I am to kill you now at point G."

Levi's eyes widened. And just when he was about to rise -- just when he was about to mouth the word, _how_ \--

09:20.

Erwin takes a few steps. Then, very carefully, he fires.

 

 

_i just need to clear my mind  
it's been racing since the summertime_

**08:45**

"All preparations ready, Commander."

Erwin stretches his arms. Strange to feel them so -- together, now, as if for the longest time in his sleep he'd been living with only one of them, and he smiles at Levi as he enters and announces himself. Levi frowns. "The hell are you smiling for, you old man?"

"Nothing," Erwin says. "I dreamt that I killed you. Isn't that odd?"

There's a slight pull at the corner of Levi's mouth, as if Erwin had just recited an age-old joke. He moves towards him, and climbs onto his lap as he straightens Erwin's collar for him. The sunlight peeking in through the windows makes him look so unreal, so alive. Erwin's arm rests on the small of his back as Levi buttons his collar close and then leans down to kiss him.

"Take care of yourself out there," he murmurs against his mouth. "I'm tired of dragging my ass after you."

"I've caused you a lot of trouble, haven't I."

"You've no idea," Levi tells him. There's a sadness in his voice that stills him from speaking any further, which Erwin doesn't expect, nor push him to explain. Only that he kisses him again.

"I have a replacement, in case anything goes wrong."

Levi tells him, "I know."

"You have an obligation to obey afterwards, whatever happens." Erwin nuzzles his throat, the tip of his chin. "But even then: come find me. Above everything else -- I need you."

And Levi only tells him, gentle as rain: "I know."

 

 

 

-end-

**Author's Note:**

> last verse is [blade runner](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blade_runner), in case you missed it.


End file.
